Yew
by With A Midnight Smile
Summary: A ten-shot of quick looks into the life of Tom Marvolo Riddle, aka Lord Voldemort. DH Compliant. Written for the Life Challenge on HPFC.
1. Birth

Yew

**Words: 384**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 1: Birth_

_"We are determined that before the sun sets on this terrible struggle, our flag will be recognized throughout the world as a symbol of freedom on the one hand and of overwhelming force on the other." General George Catlett Marshall_

It was not a happy occasion, the birth of this child. His mother was thin for a birthing woman, her cheeks gaunt and her belly fat. The name she gave the nuns was Merope Gaunt-Riddle. She asked that her son be named Tom Marvolo for his father and grandfather respectively. Not Thomas, but Tom.

But the nuns were hardly concerned with the boy at all, more with the mother. They tried feeding her while she was in labor, but she wouldn't eat. When offered water, she refused, stating that she would die when her son was born regardless of anything they gave her. "The power of a broken heart," the ugly woman said, "is far more potent than any magicks I have ever seen." She was hallucinating obviously, but the nuns halted their attempts. They hadn't the heart to go against her.

The labor was short, but the birthing was bloody. Tom Marvolo Riddle was born ten minutes to midnight on New Year's Eve – that is to say, December 31st – in 1925. His mother died ten minutes later, at the stroke of twelve as everyone celebrated the New Year.

No one was celebrating that a baby boy had just been born (though a few nuns were hoping he got his looks from his father, as the mother was so disfigured; then they amended the wish, because they had to keep in mind what sort of man a woman like that could actually net). He was placed in the nursery, cleaned and wrapped in a slightly threadbare blanket.

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**A/n: Just having fun. Expect the second part sometimes soon, maybe today. I intend to finish this by Friday (July 25), if possible.**


	2. Family

Yew

**Words: 684**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 2: Family_

_"Dream no small dream; it lacks magic. Dream large. Then make the dream real." Donald Douglas_

Six years old, and Tom Riddle was alone. He couldn't remember being alone before then, not really. Sure, the bigger boys picked on him – they picked on everyone, even the girls despite it being ungentlemanly to hit a girl – and the other kids gave him space, but he had never been so utterly _alone_ before. He didn't like that at all.

It had been a regular day. The nuns held class, most of the kids goofed off except for Tom, but he liked to learn new things. He wanted to know everything. He wanted to know how birds flew, why moths had dusty wings; he wanted to know the name of every King England had ever had and all the details of the Great War that had ended before he was even born. Tom wanted to know why the nuns feared him.

Most of all, he wanted to know why weird things happened around him.

Class let out for lunch around noon, as usual, and another not unusual thing happened; the older boys cut in line. Unfortunately for Tom, he had just grabbed his lunch mere seconds before they shoved up front. He was knocked over and his soup spilled all down his front, his bread was crushed by the feet of Alexander Daniels, who was going to be leaving the Orphanage in the next year now that he was going to be old enough to legally live as a bum on the streets. The loss of his food was a blow to Tom, since he knew he would have to wait until dinner for anything more.

Before he'd even realized it, Daniels was suddenly tripping over thin air, his soup flying into the air and the metal bowl spinning across the floor, causing one of Daniels' "friends" to trip as well. Soon, all of the cutters had fallen and someone had knocked over the soup pot.

Everyone left Tom alone for the rest of the day, but he didn't know why. He hadn't done anything! He'd been several feet away when Daniels had tripped over his own two feet; how could they even think of blaming him? The thought of this betrayal stung. They were supposed to be his _family_, weren't they? All of the kids who didn't get adopted were supposed to be brothers and sisters to each other because they had no one else in the world, weren't they? And they'd turned on him that easily.

Tom skipped dinner that night to sit in the courtyard. His _family_ didn't want him around anyway. His Dad hadn't wanted him, and his mother had been so desperate to get away from him that she _died_ just to keep him out of her hair. His grandparents never tried to find him, no one cared for the freaky little boy who did freaky things in freaky ways without knowing how or why.

"I'll make them pay," he promised quietly, "I'll make them all pay, somehow. And then they won't betray me anymore."

Slowly, he stood again, hearing the other children being hurried off to their dorms. Tom looked up at the sky, watched the stars twinkling and the waning gibbous moon shining, and made his promise one more time before heading in for the night.

His "family" was waiting, after all.

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**A/n: Yeah, getting dark already, I know. Not doing these in the order suggested in the challenge, mostly because this is what works for me. Course, I could have done a whole other order, but I didn't want to. So nyah.**


	3. World

Yew

**Words: 542**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 3: World_

_"What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?" Robert Fulghum_

It was bright; everything seemed to _glow_. Was this the world? He could feel... a hum. That was the only way he could describe it. Well, as an eleven year old boy who had just come to see his world for the first time, he could only describe it in a shocked, awe-filled, and very simple manner. So he described it as a hum that filtered in through his skin, through to his bones. It was a glow that he couldn't see, but he could taste it in the air.

This was the magical world. This was _his_ world, his father's world, and nothing was going to change that now that he knew about it.

Slowly, tentatively, he stepped through the brick archway, feeling the hum of pure power that he had associated with his "talent" for so many years, the talent he knew now as magic. Tom smirked, taking in everything. It was a clean start. He could find his father in the magical world; he could do whatever he wanted. These were his people; they wouldn't betray him like the idiotic children at the Orphanage.

The muggles.

Muggle... it was an interesting word. It was a word that made it sound as if a person was talking about an animal. Well, they _were_ animals, weren't they? Unlike the magical society that Tom was entering, they were an uncivilized sort; they had bullies, and evil; for them it was survival of the fittest. Whoever was biggest and strongest was top dog... _dog_. Yes, muggles were dogs, because they had to fight for superiority. He could already see that the magical world was different, and not because of the invisible glow or the earth-shattering hum. In his mind's eye, he saw them as all equal, because they were all magic and powerful. They were _Gods_.

Young Tom Riddle, too, was a God. He had power; even the wizard who had come to him, Professor Dumbledore, had obviously been impressed by him, to let him roam the streets alone. Most of the idiots of the Orphanage would have felt him too young, too vulnerable. Sure, Dumbledore had made him return the trophies of his triumph over the muggle dogs, but he was magic, taking pity on the pathetic plebians.

Another step into Diagon Alley. The world was humming, strumming invisible strings that sent chords of magical energy humming through his body. Another step and another and another and another... it was amazing. It was magical.

This was his world to do with as he pleased, and Tom wasn't going to let that go to waste. He would amount to something special; perhaps he would be a politician, or a teacher... a teacher. He smiled and continued down the Alley. He was Tom Riddle, after all, and would take the Wizarding World by storm.


	4. School

Yew

**Words: 730**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 4: School_

"_It will be a great day when our schools have all the money they need, and our air force has to have a bake-sale to buy a bomber." Robert Fulghum_

_It wasn't supposed to be like this_, Tom thought angrily, hands fisting in the sheets of his bed. The green satin was foreign to him, the ebony bad frame seemed to cage him in behind the soft gray curtains that separated his bed from the other boys'.

It was sometime after midnight; he didn't care how long after. Somehow, something his gone wrong. When he arrived at the train station with his too-large, too-worn clothes, people had looked down on him. A small group of other first years had sat with him on the train, but only because there was nowhere else to sit. They had ignored him the entire way. What made it worse was that, when he was Sorted into Slytherin at the drop of a hat (literally; it hadn't even touched his head before it shouted "SLYTHERIN!" to the hall), three quarters of the room seemed to automatically presume the worst of him, and his own house didn't seem to like that his robes were second hand.

Tom had looked up to the Head Table after he sat down, ignoring the other students being sorted in favor of looking to the man who had told him about the wizarding world in the first place. Professor Dumbledore had given him a look of utter disappointment.

He had almost wanted to cry just then. It was the _wizarding world_, _his_ world! It was supposed to be just and forgiving! They were wizards, higher beings; shouldn't they be above judging someone because of money?

_I was wrong_, the morose thought crawled through his mind as he stared at the darkened canopy above his head. The last time he had been wrong like this was when he had decided, all those years ago, that family was worthless. He knew it had been childish, that surely he would meet his father eventually. His undoubtedly successful father who was magic and kind and would take him from the orphanage and make him acceptable in the eyes of his cruel, childish peers. It seemed like some far off dream.

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry was not as forgiving as he had hoped, but Tom knew something better would come of it, eventually. The greeting that the portrait of Salazar Slytherin had given him was enough to know that. But no one else had heard him, it seemed, despite the cold, commanding, and sibilant voice that had carried so well to Tom's ears. It had been a message only for him.

A message to the Heir of Slytherin.

Finally relaxing into the feather bed and burying his face into the satin pillowcase, Tom sighed into the night. This school... he'd do something about it. He'd make them accept him, even if he had to go back to what he did at the Orphanage. No one would take his trophies here, either: not Headmaster Dippet, not the Head of Slytherin, Professor Slughorn, nor the Head Boy or his classmates. Especially not Professor Dumbledore.

This place screamed of home, the once invisible glow of the Alley screaming brilliantly in his eyes, the inaudible hum singing him to sleep. Tom curled around his pillow, hardly noticing the words being hissed in his ear by no one.

_"Welcome to Hogwarts, Heir."_

The next morning, he remembered little of his thoughts the night previous. Instead, he was ready to learn, to make something of himself, and Merlin himself wouldn't dare stand in his way.

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**A/n: a bit less about school than I imagined and a bit more of Tom realizing that, those whom he thought a month before could be as great as gods were really just as bad as muggles. Poor disillusioned Tommy-boy.**

**Robert Fulghum as loads of great quotes for me to use here... yay.**


	5. Grief

Yew

**Words: 732**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 5: Grief_

_"Play fair. Don't hit people. Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody." Robert Fulghum_

He stared, for a moment, eyeing his handiwork. Well, there wasn't exactly a lot more to do, now was there? It was beautiful, perfect even.

But he still felt empty from it.

Tom scrutinized the image he had created, wondering why he had this sort of _clawing_ feeling in his chest and stinging in his eyes. He'd done the right thing by himself, after all. He had avenged his mother, the one who truly gave him the gift of magic. He had avenged his childhood. So _why_ was he feeling so... hurt?

He glanced down at the slim volume in his hands, his first horcrux. That must be it. The empty feeling was because he'd just torn his soul into little pieces and stuffed one of them into his diary, there was no other reason. He had begun his reign, that was all; no more would Tom Riddle be, because Tom Riddle lay dead in his seat with his parents at his sides. No, _Lord Voldemort_ had wiped his slate clean, just like it should have been when he entered the wizarding world. He was smarter now, he knew better.

He knew he _was_ better than all of the trash who once looked down on him. Hadn't he had Cathy Myrtle killed? She was a clawing lowlife, always seeking his attention. He gave her the honor of being the first person he ever saw die, and she was already back as a ghost to pester some Gryffindor girl. Voldemort was better than all of them, that he knew, because he wasn't afraid, because he knew, because he was _Slytherin_.

And he had just taken three lives with only two words apiece.

The clawing feeling hadn't left. It was groping inside of his chest, constricting his blood passage. A few clicky footsteps approached from the direction of the doorway. Swearing quietly in parseltongue, he turned on his heel and apparated away, leaving no trace he had been in Riddle Manor at all but for three corpses sitting at the dining room table, hands still on their spoons, one even with some soup in his mouth, all wide-eyed and staring at the place where Voldemort had stood.

He resisted the urge to cackle and went about his work, attaching the appropriate memories to his last living family member, Morfin Gaunt. Somehow, this made the clawing increase. He didn't like it.

Taking enough of a look round to pocket the stone ring his uncle had been wearing, Voldemort apparated away once more.

He never felt that constricting of his chest after that, nor did he allow himself to think on it. He found the idea of such a weakness from committing mere patricide repulsive.

Voldemort would never admit that he might have actually regretted killing them, that perhaps the clawing was some sort of sadness, even grief. He was Voldemort after all. He was going to lead the world either to a bright future like he had envisioned it to be as a child, or else burn it to the ground. Either way was fine with him.

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**A/n: It was the only way I could think of to tie in grief. The question is, is the grief regarding the death of his family, or the splitting of his soul? Not telling though ;)**

**I'll get the next bit out at some point today. Not sure exactly **_**when**_**, but sometime. I dunno; probably going to be doing real life stuff today, but I think I can find the time to type up another five-hundred words or so.**

**And incase you didn't notice, I am not a fan of the theory that the first horcrux was made from Myrtle's death. I honestly don't think that one counts; Tom didn't kill her himself, the basilisk did. His soul wouldn't have shredded itself over his _pet_ killing her.**


	6. Friend

Yew

**Words: 651**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL, minor coarse language**

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_Chapter 6: Friend_

_"When you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together." Robert Fulghum_

Tom Riddle had been dead for a long time, more than ten years. Even those he had known on a daily basis at school no longer called him by the filthy muggle name, choosing instead to call him "my Lord" or, for the more privileged ones, "Voldemort." They were his...

He paused in his train of thought. What were they to him? Followers? Advisors? Mindless slaves who would go and kill the Minister for him if he asked? His train of thought paused again. He could ask them to do that later... or order them. Would either one work? He hadn't really ordered them around as much as he could have, but the question was, did he want to?

For that matter, why did they do as he asked? He was powerful, perhaps even more so than Albus Dumbledore who was still considered the best thing since self-slicing bread after almost ten years since he defeated Grindelwald. Lord Voldemort was stronger than any of them, could beat them into submission without speaking a word or flicking his wand. They knew that. Were they following him from fear? Or perhaps they wanted him to change the world. They probably thought his goal to destroy castes such as "mudblood" a valiant thing.

He smirked lightly, watching them squirm in their seats around them as they had their supper at the Hogshead. They were all so... _old-fashioned_. Many of them really did dislike muggleborn witches and wizards and thought it best to kill them off, misinterpreting his mission statement. He simply wanted the caste-system gone. If a child had potential, they were magic. If they didn't, they were muggle. It was as simple as that. Muggles were the dogs of the human world: the Chihuahua to their St. Bernard: the ant to their praying mantis: the sparrow to their eagle. Of course, if killing all muggleborn was what it took to destroy the archaic system, then he would do so. They're lives didn't particularly matter.

Getting his mind back on track, he surveyed the assembled. His 'Death Eaters' who were out to wish him good luck for his endeavor to achieve the Dark Arts position at Hogwarts. Who better to change the world than a teacher? One old Transfiguration instructor had saved it already, and teachers had the advantage of molding the minds of impressionable youth.

Was that why they had come? Was that why they followed him? Because he was going to change the world through their children? Somehow, that assessment, too, was wrong.

Loyalty was such a Hufflepuff trait, yet he whipped out a quick legilimancy probe and found many of them were loyal to him, to his cause. They were _loyal_. Like dogs... no, not like dogs. Dogs are muggle sheep (he realized he was very much crossing his metaphors, but decided not to correct himself since they were _his_ thoughts, damn it, and he could think as he liked!) who followed blindly.

With one last look at those around him, Voldemort stood from his seat and smiled a wicked smile. "Wish me luck," he ordered them, "my friends."

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**A/n: Well... that didn't quite turn out as planned, but I like it, so who really cares? Heh, it was interesting to write his thoughts on this one, especially toward the end. "Dogs are muggle sheep" teehee that was kind of... random.  
**


	7. Hatred

Yew

**Words: 651**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 7: Hatred_

"_Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harms we do, we do to ourselves." Mitch Albom_

The feeling was... hot, like having molten lava coursing through his veins. It made him want to kill something, to rend it limb from limb in the same manner that his own soul had been, but so much messier. It would be satisfying, he thought, to do something like that. Maybe then he would stop feeling like someone used an ever-burning flame of some sort to ignite his blood. Was blood flammable? He didn't actually know, but if he survived this, he would give Bellatrix the idea to try on the child before him.

Voldemort was not an overly rational man (if he could be called such), but he was feeling rather... well, the fact that he was feeling like someone had removed everything from within his body and replaced it with lava has already been covered, hasn't it? These were his main thoughts as he felt something ripping him to shreds. It wasn't the usual shreds from creating horcruxes either.

Many would wonder where this pain originated from, or even why the Dark Lord was focusing so much on setting a baby's blood on fire more than saving his own life from whatever said pain was. Voldemort did not wonder, because he knew. Of course, even if he hadn't known, he likely wouldn't have wondered because he was rather prone to not caring about the reason, and more about ripping whatever reason there was for anything to shreds.

This made many of his followers who had been around before he went public wish again for the old days where their master at least had some level of sanity, but they never voiced it. They weren't idiots, after all, unlike the younger generation of Death Eaters.

Regardless, there was a reason, and it was mostly rage, hatred, and his regular vindictive nature that had shown through more and more with each horcrux that he made. The rest was because of the child. Half of that small contribution, not even weighing two stone yet, was what the child represented; he was the one who could conquer the Dark Lord, supposedly, he was young, he had _potential_, and he was just as much a half-blood as the dark, scary man standing over him.

The rest was merely circumstantial. The child had bounced an unblockable curse right back at the caster.

In that moment, Voldemort found there was something he hated more than Dumbledore, and it had come in the form of one-year old Harry Potter. The irony that an unloved child such as he had been defeated by the brat who would doubtless be loved by the wizarding world from then on did not escape him as the scrap of soul remaining to him fled him mortal body and was whisked in a harsh wind of magic from the scene of the crime.

Oh yes, he hated that child.

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**A/n: That was hatred. Next comes Romance, then Life and Death. Should have romance out before the day is (PDT though).**

**I'm having fun writing this. Yay. Romance will be a pretty interesting one, I think, considering what I'm intending to do for it. I wonder what you all think I'll do? Teehee, well, you'll find out later!**


	8. Romance

Yew

**Words: 724**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 8: Romance_

"_Love is stronger than death even though it can't stop death from happening, but no matter how hard death tries it can't separate people from love. It can't take away our memories either. In the end, life is stronger than death." Anonymous_

The name had been picked when he was just thirteen years old. Voldemort. Flight of death. Some of the other students who had known about his nickname, when he was still considered a lowlife, had believed it meant to flee away from death. Fear was a foreign concept to him, however. He didn't fear death, so much as plan to keep living through eternity, so death had never really been an option.

He was very much reassessing that thought.

As a matter of fact, the Dark Lord had been thinking about death quite a bit since the world had started to believe him dead in the first place. He was less than the meanest of ghosts, unable to affect anything. Even a true ghost could not see him easily. Oh, he could possess creatures, weak ones, but only if they gave themselves willingly to his power or lack thereof. The rats who were stupid enough to agree were always first to die, whereas the snakes who respected his lineage were stronger hosts, but hardly lasted any longer than the rats.

Simply put, everything he touched died, usually a painful death that ended with the creature in ashes. It wasn't a pretty sight. Each time he evacuated just before death took the creature, because if his host died with him in it, he wasn't sure how long he would last. He was feeding off only the extra energy radiating from his horcruxes, and those were miles away.

His main problem was that, without a human host, his scraps of soul could not return to British soil. That person would die within a year, and then he would be sent back to Albania. By that time, he hoped to drink enough unicorn's blood to sustain him for the time necessary to nurse off of the rare magical viper he had found (he would never possess her; Nagini's venom was a key to his resurrection) and he would eventually regain a body without having to waste one of his horcruxes. The problem with that was waiting.

And every minute wasted was another minute he spent flirting with death.

She was a fickle mistress, Voldemort decided. One minute she seemed about to snatch him from his semi-mortal life, the next it was like she had forgotten he existed totally. In the second moments, he pined, almost. He liked death, in that he liked to see things die and be the cause of that death.

Sometimes, he would even consider waxing poetic about the idea of dying; he would not, after all, actually be dead at that point. He had his horcruxes. Lucius had one of his horcruxes. Lucius, one of his most loyal, would eventually plant his diary, and if he had died he could take control of the soul fragment therein, could he not? Horcrux theory was shaky at best, but so was his sanity.

And with every thought winding, every creature who lay dying, Voldemort flirted with death, coming close enough to kiss, to caress, but never quite touching.

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**A/n: Not quite as romance oriented as it ought to be, probably, but the idea of Voldemort alternately flirting with Death and running from it was... interesting. I wanted to try it out, and I suppose it fits with the rest of the fic... maybe.**

**Right, so there's two left to come out tomorrow. I'm not sure if I should be excited or disappointed this really is kind of a fun thing to write! But I have other things (like my main stories) to worry and write about, and I can always take up more challenges.**

**See you tomorrow with Life and Death.**


	9. Life

Yew

**Words: 487**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL**

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_Chapter 9: Life_

_"I have never in my life learned anything from any man who agreed with me." Dudley Field Malone_

Sensation is interesting. To feel is interesting, the touch of fabric along alabaster skin, a slim shaft of wood gliding between fingers, a breath of air, tickling just so. Yes, to feel the corporeal world with new nerves and fresh skin was an unmatchable feeling that Voldemort doubted many other than he would ever be cognizant to feel. It was glorious, that after years of being incorporeal, and then only being a bundle of skin and dead nerves, that he could _feel_ again. The pump of blood in his head, the whisper of wind through the graveyard... _this_ was true magic.

It was a terrible cliché, he realized suddenly, that he should be reborn at a graveyard. Well, most things he did were terrible clichés, in particular his love for monologues... well, he wasn't going to give _those_ up. The Light were all a bunch of well-mannered idiots who couldn't take advantage of such a situation in the first place; even if they did, his Death Eaters were always on high alert when he was monologuing anyways, since that was when the crucios usually got tossed about.

The swirling of the potion that had returned him to life could be felt around his calves as he stood in the smooth bottomed cauldron. It was hot, scalding his legs and feet as a matter of fact and soaking the fresh robe he had put on. Slowly, he stepped out, feeling the cool night sir dancing along his red, raw feet as he placed them on the crisp, dewy grass. Sweet Merlin, the _sensations_ of life!

He was hard put to remember what anything felt like when he was alive, before. The sun was hot, water was cold, he knew it, but remembering the feeling of grass between his toes... _this_ was why he strove so hard to become immortal. Death was less than the meanest shadow of this. The dance he had undergone with the very theory of death the past thirteen and a half years was ages away as he stalked from the dance floor into something more meaningful. He would _live_, damn it, and no one would stop this flight from death.

Not even the boy tied to the tombstone behind him who had started the daring dance on his behalf.

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**A/n: a shorter one, but this was all that this chapter needed, I think. Death should be up in the next few hours.**


	10. Death

Yew

**Words: 585**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. This was written for the HPFC Life Challenge by mustardgirl1128.**

**Warnings: It's all Riddly and EVOL, DH spoilers**

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_Chapter 10: Death_

_"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death."_

"_Avada Kedavra!_"

"_Expelliarmus!_"

The two shouts, simultaneous, spelled an end. There was a blast of golden fire that blinded him. The Elder Wand was wrenched from his hands, he felt, but he didn't know anything more but the sensation of wrenching soul. All because he'd been dumb enough to allow himself to be betrayed.

It had never been quite so painful for his soul to rip before, but perhaps it was because this was a different sort of ripping than in the creation of the horcruxes, or when he had been defeated by an infant. His soul was not tearing itself into pieces, nor was it slipping from a mortal body. That last fragment of soul had been connected to his body by dark rituals, and the pain it caused to rip away from the body was more than he could handle.

For a split second in time, he seemed to himself to be floating, flying again as he had learned to do two years before, yet he knew better. There was no sensation. He couldn't feel the cloth of his robes against his skin, his boots on his feet, or air against his neck. He could feel that he even had limbs, their weight seeming to have vanished all of a sudden.

It was a dangerous dance he had done all his life, first dancing a clumsy, ignorant sort of foxtrot, and an idealistic Viennese waltz after. Then his dangerous tango started, dancing with death in his own way, tossing her his dance partners every off step in an effort to delay the inevitability of their own dance together. He danced around her, tricking her, toying with her, but in the end she got him.

And he couldn't feel his legs to keep up the dance any longer.

X.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.X

**A/n: I'm not sure when or how this chapter ended up becoming about dancing (I even looked up ballroom dancing on wikipedia), but wow... not at all what I was intending to end it with, but I guess it works with the continued allusion to Romance, Life, and Hatred with some small bits of other things here and there, I suppose.**

**Now, I think I will explain my whole reason for picking "Yew" as the title. First, and most obvious, is that Voldemort's wand is made of yew. Yew is the tree of life, death, and rebirth, which is also fitting (I'm contemplating writing an eleventh part called Afterlife, but I very much doubt that will happen. I had enough fun with this as is, and I wouldn't know what to write). My third reason... well, I like homophones.**

**Thanks muchly to mustardgirl1128 for putting out the challenge and for giving such stellar reviews throughout the process. Thanks to Kore-of-Myth for reviewing a bunch too and telling me when I mis-spell things (stupid typos). It was a fun way to spend my week.**

**Semi-odd thingy I noticed: not once have I used the word yew in any chapter of this story.**


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